Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Hey so I played a game recently (four objectives with standard 12" deployment zone) against guard and i got royally trashed. He was running a kasrkin squad, a full guard platoon and a chimera, an HQ with lord commisar and master of ordanance, ratlings, and a heavy weapon team of two lascannons and a missile (or thereabouts) for 1000 pts and I had a cheap fireknife commander, two standard outfitted firewarrior squads (bonded, sgt etc) a devilfish, six stealth suits and three marker drones, twelve kroot, shaper, and two kroothounds, a piranha, and a hammerhead, also about 1000 pts

I know there are huge weaknesses in the list I was running, but I looked back on it and the standard Tau fix all ("More crisis suits!") wouldn't have saved me. I needed more troop choices but also didnt have enough heavy fire to destroy his tougher units and the AV12 building one of the objectives was in.

To that end I hope to enlist the gods of Dakka to help me royally him up next time
help?

Take Two Hammer heads with multitracker and disruption pods and just fire a bunch of blast templets on him you could also try 2 units of 20 kroot no krotox and try to outflank or infiltrate in some nice woods =] i would drop the 6 stealth suits and for for more regular crisis suits IMO
perhaps drop down to one unit of fire warriors relatively small and try to fit in some flamers if your really tailoring your list that way they drop down somewhat dangerous but then he has to split fire giving you kroot an opportunity to make it there to combat little more then piece meal hope this helps good luck. Btw is he combine squading them?

1)What models do you have available?

2)How competitive are you looking to go? Fluffy, Semi-Comp, or Full Comp?

3)The Stealth team is a massive points sink at this point level.

4)Kroot unit is not optimized. I refer you to my question in line 2)

5)You have no redundancy/back ups for if a crucial unit is destroyed.

Will talk more when you post the units you have available to build with.

Later

I'm with focusedfire.

TCP has good advice. Can you swing two Railheads? Those two, without more XV8s, might do it.

ah but see thats the thing (real quick im looking semi-comp because i lack the strategic know-how to fully utilize fully comp so it'd be a waste of time and money)
i did the math, and six stealth suits is less than three crisis suits outfitted for optimal survival AND put out more shots (fifteen+ compared to the twelve to six crisis suits put out
his kasrkins are what ed me over, deep struck and nailed one of my only three troop choices
i was actually debating dropping the kroot for another FW team, more higher str shots with better armor pen and better svs, since theyre comparably the same points
as to spare models, im purchasing three broadsides (got em cheaper on ebay) and am looking into getting three more crisis suits.
my current army (almost 1400 pts) is:
Fireknife Shas'o (shas'el at 1000 pts or less) with hw MT and Shield generator (to give him that coveted HQ 4++)
2 squads of template FW (12 guys, one is a sgt, all bonded) but no markerlights due to point cost (waaay too expensive) and reduction of firepower for a turn (11:1 is not a good trade off)
1 14man squad of kroot (12 kroot, one is a shaper, two kroothounds cause im poor and didnt get chaos warhounds instead)
six stealth suits, three marker drones, with FB and Target Lock
Hammerhead with railgun, sm system, disruption pod, decoy launcher, MT and (optionally) 2 seekers
two devilfish, each with disruption pod, decoy launcher, and optionally a seeker each
a piranha with disruption pod and decoy launchers
and 6 gun drones lying around that i use as a point filler.
I've also been looking to purchase a new Hammerhead and had considered doing so (just didnt get it in time to use it)
if i can scrimp for three suits ima run them all fireknife (or one deathrain and 2 fireknife) with two shield drones, obligatory drone controller, MTs all around, team leader (not the full stat upgrade just the one that lets him take HW systems, talk about a stupid ass rule...) bonded and if play testing proves i need it, a shield for the team leader..tho i dont expect to come across enough AP3+ weapons to worry too much about that
I say this after having just admitted getting screwed by a sqaud with AP3 weapons...
but yea so theres what i got. personally i dont like pathfinders (except for their fluffiness) cause they're static and it makes me too dependant on markerlights
im also debating another piranha, since it was my mvp in the last game (beat up his chimera, and killed sum guard and wiped out a sqaud by ramming them...
any advice is much appreciated

@dbsamurai-Sounds like you already knew what to do but just didn't have the models to pull it off.

As far as advice. Purchase models for your HS first, then the second(Make it third, it'll be worth it)Pirahna. You really wont need more than 6 XV8 total for most games. Sounds like you already know to get more hounds for the Kroot.

At the 1000 point level I want to give you some ideas to think about(I almost never build lists for people because I believe each person has their own personal playstyle that they have to find for themselves).

In Heavy support:

2 XV88's with one equipped with HWTL-rest of equip is up to you(Shoot for less than 200 points)

1 Ionhead

In FA:

1 Squadron of 2 Piranha

Your HQ:

A Cheap Shas'el equipped to your taste(Try to keep him under 100 pts)

Elite:

A CHEAP squad of 2 XV8's(Shoot for 90 points for the whole team)

A Monat for the Shas'el to join(Under 55 points)

Troops:

Build to your preference

This is a loose frame work for you to play with. If you want 3 squads of troops with two in transports then the Ion head will go



Play around with this and let me know how things work out or if you have specific questions.

Happy Hunting

tried that out (minus the XV8s cause i aint got em yet) running broadsides and my railhead as an ionhead...two troops of fw, one of kroot like b4, and proxied a few piranhas and another fw squad to make up for the ionhead's lower cost (about 8 guys)
worked out alright, the piranhas did most of the tank killing, but the ionhead was...well...pathetic. as nice as the STr 7 AP3 shots were, they're just not useful against large numbers, cause on average i'd only hit with two or even one of them (since there are only 3) and while those shots were pretty much garunteed insta-kill, they couldnt do anything better than the broadsides. i ended up only killing his heavy weapons team with it cause of their stupid 2 wounds (please note i played a different guy who ran almost all cheapos but still had kasrkin and a super powered CCS with Master of Ordanance, Lord Commisar, and something else that was scary...) I got lucky in this case because all of the guns he brought i could outrange in some way, so my kroot really were the only ones who took a beating. (and this time i had cover to stick my backfield objective in, so when he too tried to DS his kasrs right next to me and shoot me up, i had a cover save)
all I liked most of the list, so thanks for the suggestions focused fire (yay piranhas...i need more of those...with fusion blasters...) but the ionhead only proved why i've never run an ionhead...it never really made sense to forgo a large blast for three shots unless i was playing marines or deathwing or ravenwing or something similar.

dbsamurai wrote:i ended up only killing his heavy weapons team with it cause of their stupid 2 wounds

Did you take into account instant death here? HWT are T3, Ion is S7...

yea i got lucky and hit with all three and wounded all three and since the ion cannon is AP 3 it gave them a bad case of INSTANT DEATH
sadly i still got nailed...
those three shots weren't enough to dent his infantry platoon
five ten man squads were also too much for my fw
the piranhas were the only thing that saved me, TSing right into them (they were separate but all lined up across the board) basicly i had three piranhas and formed a fish of fury with them to stop the lil buggers
and flashlights cant hurt gak on a piranha DDDD

@dbsamurai- Sounds like you might have an unfair prejudice against the Ion Cannon. If this is the case you may be creating a self fullfilling prophecy of disappointment by the targets you pick to shoot with it.

The Ion Cannon is a good solid multi-use weapon, especially in low point games. It has specific areas where it shines and other areas where it lags. If you are using it against MEQ, Light Vehicles, and MC's it is very effective. Against AV 13+ and horde the Ion Cannon is weak.

When building an all-comers list you will have units that don't do much against some opponents but really well against others. Take the two following examples:

The Ion Cannons job against IG is to beat up sentinels squadrons and Chimera side Armour. Against the 12 front armour it is very "MEH". So if your facing a Guard build that doesn't have Sentinels Squadrons and Chimeras then the Ion Cannon will be innefficient.

Against MEQ, You'll love the combo of opening up a SM transport with MP's(Railguns against LR's) then starting on the now open squad with the Ion Cannon. It also does a number on the SM VoF units and fast movers(Land Speeders)

It comes down to whether you pefer to build against GEQ or MEQ.

After having said all of this I will now say, feel free to ignore everything I just posted. Seriously, This is because each person has units that work for them and others that just don't fit. In other words, "To each their own playstyle".

I'm just glad I was able to help.

oh yea so totally agree with you...the problem is all the guard guys i face play hordes...
like this guy who tottally annihilated me, he had 1 Sentinal (not a squad, one sentinel) and one chimera...the rest were troops of some sort...
tho the ionhead was Aces at nixing those annoying multiwound models, and i like its lower point cost
that said, i think it should be run (at least against hordes) alongside a railhead, because of what you said,
that one is good at one, one is good at the other, so i can pop his 2 total vehicles with the ionhead, and nix his squishies with the sub round
you've definately openned up an avenue i hadn't considered for me however, as now i can (for the price of say...fourteen kroot) get a gun that can safely fire at his annoying units i would waste fusion blaster or railgun shots on